1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a method for cleaning and erasing printing surfaces, in particular printing surfaces of forme and blanket cylinders in a printing machine, wherein cleaning media is applied either directly or indirectly to the surface of the printing forme.
2. Description of the Related Art
DE 44 26 012 A1, which corresponds to U.S. Pat. No. 6,016,750, discloses a method of erasing a printing forme which can have an image set and can be erased directly. Following the printing operation, there may be both ink and image carrier materials representing the printing image on such a printing surface. These have to be removed. This is done by means of suitable cleaning media and a suitable cleaning apparatus. A cleaning apparatus of this type is described in the application DE 44 26 012 A1.
The disadvantage of the apparatus and of the method described in DE 44 26 012 A1 is that the cleaning and the erasing is always designed for a printing surface which has a maximum area coverage—100% area coverage—with ink and image carrier material. As a rule, this does not occur, normally the area coverages are considerably lower, so that as a rule too much material and time is used in the cleaning and erasing.